A study by a job-matching service called TheLadders found that the average resume gets SIX SECONDS of attention. They tracked employers’ eye movement to see what they looked at most on a resume.

–DON’T include a photo: Not that you would on your resume, but sites like LinkedIn allow you to, and it actually HURTS your chances with an employer. They spend 19% of the time looking at the photo instead of your qualifications.

–DO make it easy to read, even if you leave off some information: Professionally-rewritten resumes were 40% more effective than the original. The pros make it clearly formatted and easy to skim, and they do it by cutting out a lot of information.

–DO include dates: 80% of the resume review time was spent looking at relatively dull-sounding information, including your current and previous job titles, and the start and end dates for your current and past jobs.